Former Deputy Chief Medical Officer Nick Coatsworth has warned the Victorian government could face a spate of lawsuits following a recent court judgement that ruled vaccine mandates on emergency services was unlawful.
On Feb. 27, the Queensland Supreme Court issued a ruling on a class action lawsuit against the Queensland Police Service and Queensland Ambulance Service over their compulsory COVID-19 vaccine requirements for employees between 2021 and 2022.
While the judge believed the mandates imposed by the two agencies were reasonable given the emergency of the pandemic, they found that the directions breached the Human Rights Act 2019 (Qld) and were thus, unlawful.
The rulings sent a shockwave across the Australian public and raised questions about its implications.
In an interview with 9 News, Mr. Coatsworth said the rulings opened the possibility for other workers impacted by the vaccine mandates.
“It could mean a number of things. It could mean that some of them get their jobs back,” he said.
“It could open the way for civil proceedings and damages against the governments with the Human Rights Act.”
Mr. Coatsworth added that the rulings could cause senior government officials to rethink the decisions they made during the pandemic.
“Did we have regard to Australians human rights when we made those decisions, and to what extent did we balance those decisions against human rights?” he said.
“And I think going forward, that’s probably the most important thing of these decisions.”
At the same time, the former deputy chief said other states, such as Victoria, needed to keep an eye on lawsuits from the public following the Queensland Supreme Court’s decision.
“There must be cases going on down there. And I think that if we’re going to have human rights acts, they’re supposed to be protective of people’s rights,” he said.
He then suggested those powers be removed from state governments and transferred to the federal government to avoid problems in future pandemic responses.
